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The Promise of On-Demand Viewing: From "What's Out" to "What's Great"

John Farr | Posted September 8, 2008 | Entertainment

Read More: Annie Hall, Dvds, Ella Fitzgerald, Foreign Films, Great Films, Hannah And Her Sisters, Hollywood, Movies, On-Demand Movies, Pay TV, Picasso, Renoir, Robert Altman, The Beatles, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Woody Allen

We all know what "on-demand" means, but for many of us, its use has been limited to ordering new mainstream releases via "Pay" TV channels on our cable system. This is but a small part of what on-demand will eventually make possible as it gets perfected and implemented over the...

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5-Inch Heels: A Users Guide

Kira Craft | Posted September 8, 2008 | Style

Read More: Fashion Week, Five Inch Heels, Manolo Blahnik, New York Fashion Week, New York Fashion Week 2008, Stilettos

Nice girls don't wear five-inch heels. Or at least- they didn't. Lately, the same skyscraper shoes you would find in the red light district have been given a spit and polish by the fashion cognoscenti.

The platform silhouette that's been gaining ground...

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We Need to Structure, Organize the Web

Patricia Handschiegel | Posted September 8, 2008 | Media

Read More: Digital, Entertainment, Internet, Internet Business, Media, New Media, Web 2.0

Imagine if broadcast television and radio audiences had to almost blindly seek out shows and stations upon turning on their devices. Rather than finding things in a neat, orderly fashion - with plenty of guides to help them - they instead had to haphazardly locate it themselves. Think about how...

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To Boldly Go Where No Californians Have Gone Before

Tom Gregory | Posted September 8, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Brad Altman, Divorce, Evangelicals, George Takei, Japanese Internment, Marriage, Proposition 8, Religious Fundamentalism, Same Sex Marriage, Same-Sex Marriage, Separation Of Church And State, Star Trek

America--where dreams soar, lives flourish, and today's work strives to make a better tomorrow.

Freedom, democracy, and equality have always been our goal; our system of check and balances has served us well. Throughout history we've...

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The Week McCain's Environmental Credentials Went Extinct

Jeremy Jacquot | Posted September 8, 2008 | Green

Read More: Alaska, Climate Change, Environment, John McCain, Offshore Drilling, Sarah Palin

It's hard to pinpoint the precise moment when (what was left of) McCain's environmental bona fides hit the skids, but, if I had to pick, I would say it was right around the time his running mate, Sarah Palin, officially accepted the vice-presidential nomination. (Or was it when McCain boasted...

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The Delegate From Sadr City

Joshuah Bearman | Posted September 8, 2008 |

Read More: 2008 Campaign, Delegates, Democrats, Denver, Dnc, Iraq, Washington

Ah, Remember the DNC? Before Hurricane Palin, before the GOP knives were drawn in Minneapolis, there were those halcyon days back in Denver when politics were about ideas and the future and people actually believed in things. If anyone wants to be reminded of the genuine efforts of someone who...

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Pitbull Owners Blast Palin

Andy Borowitz | Posted September 8, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Andy Borowitz, Barack Obama, Jeffrey Toobin, John McCain, Joy Behar, Pitbull, Pitbull In Lipstick, Sarah Palin

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, who famously compared herself to a pitbull in her vice-presidential acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, appears to have antagonized a key voting bloc in the upcoming election, the nation's pitbull owners.

While Gov. Palin's assertion that the only difference between a hockey mom and...

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The Conventions as Infomercials: I'm Sold!

Billy Kimball | Posted September 8, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Conventions, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Media, Republican Convention

Two Tuesdays past, when Hillary Clinton took the stage at the Democratic Convention in Denver in her Day-Glo pantsuit looking for all the world like a human highway cone, my immediate reaction was, "Is she here to speak or is she here to make balloon animals?" At first blush, this...

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We're in big trouble.

Naomi Foner | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Election, Sarah Palin

We're talking to ourselves.
And we're not saying anything that's going to help win this election.
Everyone who cares knows that Sara Palin is a born again, right wing Republican. That she's a right to life, antigay, anti global warming, book banning kind of gal.
No...

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Looking at the RNC Through Muslim Eyes

Shahed Amanullah | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Islam, Muslims, Republican Convention, Republicans Muslims, Rnc, Rudy Guiliani

If you listened closely during the various speeches at the RNC convention, you'll notice that the times when the crowd was most animated was when Republican rage was focused on what Sen. John McCain calls the "trancendent challenge of our time: the threat of radical Islamic terrorism." Various speakers through...

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Third Screen: Crime and Punishment and What I Wore

Vickie Karp | Posted September 7, 2008 | Entertainment

Read More: Beauty Pageants, Bogota, Hbo, La Corona, The Crown, Women's Prisons

"Columbia is full of beauty queens," says Columbian soap opera star Laisa, "We have beauty pageants for everything. Miss Yuca. Miss Potato. Miss Jelly. The only one we don't have is Miss Cocaine, thank God."

You can meet Laisa, her co-judges, the denizens of cell blocks one through nine, some...

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Omnipotent -- The Slowly Dwindling Power of Religion

Daniel Cubias | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

Read More: 2008 Presidential Race, Bristol Palin Pregnancy, Catholic Church, Hispanic, Latinos, Religion, Sarah Palin

Forgive me for being a bit tardy on this news item, as well as for straying -- initially at least -- from my professed subject matter.

But I've been thinking a lot lately about Bristol Palin, who is, as you know, the Republican VP candidate's poor knocked-up teenage daughter.

Religious...

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"Dream Weaver" -- Why Gary Wright Backs Barack Obama

Howie Klein | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Barack Obama, Dream Weaver, Gary Wright, Hope

Not all artists get angry when political figures appropriate their music for campaigns. Many people are aware how furious the Wilson sisters are about how McCain pirated the classic Heart song, "Barracuda," to further the mythologizing of right-wing extremist Sarah Palin. Meanwhile, though, every other songwriter in the world...

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John McCain: Campaign Lobbyist in Chief

Janet Ritz | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

John McCain's attempted co-opt of the Obama campaign's change message avoids the fact that McCain has surrounded himself with a campaign staff of top Washington Republican lobbyists:

When McCain huddled with his closest advisers at his rustic Arizona cabin last weekend to map out his presidential campaign, virtually every...

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Wheel of Misfortune: Memories of a Doomed Contestant

Joel Schwartzberg | Posted September 7, 2008 | Media

Read More: Game Shows, Merv Griffin, Pat Sajak, Vanna White, Wheel Of Fortune

Wheel of Fortune, the longest-running syndicated game show in American television history, is celebrating a special anniversary this month -- one quarter-century of syndication. You may not be breaking out the party hats, but this milestone makes me think of my own "Wheel World" experience as a contestant --...

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Moosing Sarah -- Time for the Dems to Leash the Pitbull

Benjamin R. Barber | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Barack Obama, Sarah Palin, Sarah Palin Reaction

It seems forever since the Democrats completed their triumphant Convention in Denver with its Obama/Biden/Clinton/Kennedy unity ticket and its intoxicating sense of take-it-to-the-finish line momentum. What happened? Not Sarah Palin. How could a small-time Alaska mayor and first term Governor derail the Obama freight train? No it was not Sarah...

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Now Sudan Is Attacking Refugee Camps

Mia Farrow | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Darfur, Darfur Sudan, Kalma Camp, Mia Farrow, Refugees, Sudan

By Mia Farrow and Eric Reeves

At 6 a.m. on the morning of Aug. 25, Kalma camp, home to 90,000 displaced Darfuris, was surrounded by Sudanese government forces. By 7 a.m., 60 heavily armed military vehicles had entered the camp, shooting and setting straw huts ablaze. Terrified civilians -- who...

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What Governor Palin Needs to Know About 'Love'

Steve Ralls | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

Read More: 2008 Election, Alaska, Ex-Gay, Gay Rights, Lgbt, LGBT Youth, Pflag, Sarah Palin, Wasilla

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has made history as the first mother to be on the Republican presidential ticket, and she has the potential to bring a new perspective on issues that impact America's children to Washington and the White House. Indeed, since her introduction to the nation last week, Governor...

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Here's How to Tune in to Both Muslims and the Deep South

Johann Hari | Posted September 7, 2008 | Entertainment

Read More: Country Music, Gaza, Heavy Metal, Islam, Muslim Fundementalists, Muslims Music, Ozzy Osbourne

I have a confession to make. I love not one despised style of music, but two: Heavy Metal, and Country and Western. As they scroll down my i-Pod, my friends weep - and retch. And it gets worse: I believe these eruptions of noise offer a political parable. Really: set...

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Disdain Versus Change

Jared Bernstein | Posted September 7, 2008 | Politics

Read More: Economy, John McCain, Republican Convention, Rudy Giuliani, Sarah Palin

Last week in this space I applauded the fact that a few important shards of reality broke through the predictable pageantry of the Democratic National Convention. This week, it is hard not to boo the truly fantastical specter of the RNC, where reality was banished from the hall.

...

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All posts from 09.08.2008 < 09.07.2008